Touch-screen devices and more recent multi-touch-screen devices, such as the iPad available from Apple Computer and many other types of tablets, netbooks, and other computers available from many manufacturers, have become increasingly popular. Input techniques for touch-screen devices often use dual-touch (e.g., simultaneously registering a user's two finger tips touching the screen) or multi-touch (e.g., simultaneously registering two, three, or more touches on the touch screen). The term multi-touch may be understood to include dual-touch.
A Touch Gesture Reference Guide by C. Villamor et al., available at www.lukew.com, describes gestures used for most touch commands. The guide includes information on using gestures to support user actions, visual representations of gestures, and outlines of how popular software platforms support touch gestures.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,339,580 to Westerman et al. states that it discloses apparatuses and methods for simultaneously tracking multiple finger and palm contacts as hands approach, touch, and slide across a proximity-sensing, compliant, and flexible multi-touch surface that consists of compressible cushion dielectric, electrode, and circuitry layers.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,728,823 to Lyon et al. states that it describes an input device and system that acquires raw track pad sensor data that is transmitted to a computer that analyzes it.
Various uses of multi-touch are known. For example, as depicted in FIG. 1A, touching an object or icon 100 on a touch-screen display 110 with the tips of two fingers 120, 122 and rotating the finger-tips while continuing to touch the display 110 corresponds to or causes the touched object 100 to rotate accordingly, e.g., by one-quarter turn as shown. For another example, as depicted in FIG. 1B, touching the display 110 with the tips of four fingers and swiping or sliding the finger-tips while continuing to touch the display 110 corresponds to or causes hiding all open windows 130, 140, 150 on the screen 110, leaving a blank screen or desktop as shown.
Another type of touch command relates to duplicating or copying an object that is displayed on the touch screen. A typical technique of duplicating an object on a touch display is depicted in FIGS. 2A, 2B, and 2C.
In FIG. 2A, a user presses for a period of time longer than normal on an object 200 by touching and pressing with the tip of one finger 210. In response to the long-press, and shown in FIG. 2B, a context menu 220 is displayed. From the context menu, a user may select the object, cut the object (e.g., delete and copy), or copy the object. When a user chooses the copy option, e.g., by tapping with a fingertip, a duplicate 202 of the object 200 is created.
However, such methods may be cumbersome for users seeking to copy objects via a touch screen display. It will be appreciated that new and improved techniques of user control of touch screen displays are continuously sought after.